The Best Mobility and Stability Exercises to Improve the Front Rack: Part 1 – Addressing the Thoracic Spine

One of my recent patients came in after a cervical fusion surgery looking to get back into crossfit.  We addressed the neck issues and started reintroducing crossfit exercises back into his program.  One big issue we found was some subpar position in the front rack position (That and a lack of ankle dorsiflexion we’ve been working vigorously on).

If you lack the motion required to get into a proper front rack you’re going to have issues with a long list of exercises:

This lack of front rack is bound to leave you being far less efficient then you could be (ie: weaker, slower).  If you’re having trouble with the rack and continue pushing through these exercises you also may end up with a pretty nasty shoulder problems too.  Keep in mind that the shoulder isn’t the only area that takes a beating, you can get problems up and down the chain as well.  Anyone else out there ever experience wrist pain after thrusters or some pretty intense upper back stiffness following some front squats gone wrong?  The elbow can also take a beating here too.

I see poor front rack position fairly often and like I mentioned earlier, I actually ended up with some pretty nasty internal impingement (internal impingement explained HERE) symptoms in the winter of 2012 I attribute to a poor front rack.  Healing was slow and it took about 6 months until I was hitting new PRs with cleans and overhead work again.  My symptoms were plenty of pain right in the back of my shoulder whenever I tried to externally rotate my shoulder to end range (Or get into a front rack position).

The front rack (and subsequent push jerk/press) can be especially aggravating to the posterior musculature of the shoulder.  I see quite a few …read more

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